


Robert/Damien

by Ticklishanimeboysaremylife



Category: The Bright Sessions (Podcast)
Genre: Angst, Fluff, M/M, Superpowers, Tickle Fights, Tickle fic, Tickling, tickle kink
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-25
Updated: 2021-01-25
Packaged: 2021-03-18 08:01:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,625
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28988940
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ticklishanimeboysaremylife/pseuds/Ticklishanimeboysaremylife
Summary: Damien has a secret that he’s never been able to share with anyone. Mark helps him with it.
Relationships: Mark Bryant/Damien
Kudos: 9





	Robert/Damien

He was with Angela Jackson when it first happened. 

Robert hadn’t figured out he liked tickling till his first year of high school, back when he was Robert, not Damien. His parents abandonment was still a fresh wound and loneliness crept into his pores like a disease, one he was quickly finding to be incurable. He had tried to seek out companionship from his fellow students, but he could never be sure if it was real friendship or just another unconscious desire he had turned into reality.

When Angela Jackson had first approached him and asked him out on a date he had been sure he was dreaming. Even if he had been subconsciously wishing someone would ask him, he hadn’t thought of her specifically and she was too far out of range anyway. The logical conclusion was that she genuinely wanted to ask him out, but the idea was so preposterous that Robert dismissed the idea almost immediately, assuming that there was some catch that he was missing here. He accepted, hesitantly, and when their date went semi-okay it was he who asked her out on another one.

It was a two week relationship, lasting only as long as the time it took Robert to realize she had asked him out on a dare and that his ability had been tethering her to him. It was during those two weeks, however, that Robert made a discovery about himself.

They were kissing behind the school and her hands were slipped halfway up his shirt. This was the farthest Robert had ever gotten with anyone and the farthest he would get for quite a while. He never allowed things to evolve past kissing, too many parts of him worried about the implications of anything more. She was warm though and he couldn’t find it in himself to pull away, so he allowed her hands to remain there, sliding ever-so-gently up his sides.

Robert was just starting to get really into it when her touch softened the tiniest of bits and he stiffened, a faint shudder of feeling coursing through him. It tickled. Shit. He moved from her lips to her neck, a step the two of them were still tentative about, if only to hide the growing smile evolving on his lips. He didn’t stop her though, and after a moment he realized he didn’t want her to stop. In fact, he wanted so much more than the occasional twitches she was giving him.

It took only that second of wanting before her touches became much less soothing and a lot more tickly, fingers wiggling into sensitive skin and digging into his sides. He snorted, knees buckling, and reaffirmed his grip on her to make sure they both didn’t instantly fall to the ground.

“W-Whahat are you d-dohoing?” he giggled, resenting the sound but unable to help it as nimble fingers undid his nervous system. “Whahahait!”

“I didn’t realize you were ticklish,” she gasped, and he blushed bright crimson, infinitely glad that his face was hidden. “This is adorable!”

“P-Pffft, ehehe, gohohod!” He trembled against her, gripping her body tightly but never moving to stop the unbearable torture. The feeling of her body pressed up against his, the way she was slowly unraveling him with delicate touches, as well as the warmth emanating from her person all served to fill Robert with a pleasant glow that he had never experienced before. It was almost like the feeling he got from using his ability, the undeniable thrill of control. That feeling was laced with bitterness and spite, however, and this was… god, this was everything. This was giving up power, being completely helpless for once, abandoning himself to the foreign sensations.

It was the rushing delight of losing all control.

It didn’t let up either. Though at the time Robert was not fully aware that he was using his ability, it worked under the radar to make sure that he secured the wrecking that he desired. Possibly it lasted an hour. Possibly it lasted fifteen minutes. Time had long since given up meaning. He collapsed to the ground quickly after that and she took advantage of his prone position, seeking out every spot to make him flail because he knew himself and he knew where he wanted to be tickled most. It was heaven. It was hell. It was everything he could have ever wanted.

When she was finished and he was howling with rabid laughter, she finally let up and held out a hand to help him to his feet. Robert was shaking all over, his words coming out in breathy rasps as his vocal cords were overextended from laughing, and he couldn’t have been happier.

A week later when Angela broke up with him and he had to face everything that had gone down between them, that feeling of happiness faded into crippling mortification and the loneliness that seeped in after her absence. He sat alone in his room for a week, skipping school entirely, not that any of his teachers minded. They never did in the end. He slept for most of his time, or tried to, and attempted not to think about the feeling of Angela’s hands or their encounter outside the school.

It was years later before he found himself close enough to anyone for the problem to resurface. He had thus far pushed the subject of tickling to the back of his mind, hoping that if he didn’t focus on it then it would disappear; and for a moment it did. This was partly due to distancing himself from other people and partly because he was so focused on trying to get by from day to day without collapsing in on himself, that he couldn’t find the time to think on it.

Robert, not yet Damien but soon to be, was curled up on the couch with Neon and Marley when it finally happened again. Indah was at work, so for the moment it was just the three of them. Though Robert wasn’t yet brave enough to commit to any kind of genuine cuddling, he allowed himself to lean his body against Neon’s, basking in her comforting presence. He was sprawled just slightly on the couch, his feet resting mere inches from Marley’s lap. Marley and Neon were submerged in casual conversation, and Robert found himself content to simply listen to the soft murmur of their combined voices.

This was what happiness felt like. He was sure of it. His limbs were fluid, almost like honey, and a smile lingered on his features that he couldn’t erase no matter how hard he tried. He felt like bursting. He was also, at the same time, strangely tired. He felt safe in falling asleep around the two of them, knowing that later that evening, when he would be roused for dinner, everything would be okay and they would love him and that was all that mattered in the end.

Right as he was drifting off, however, he felt Marley’s foot bump into his own, his toes accidentally scraping against his sole. Because they were distracted by conversation, Robert was able to conceal the small jump the action caused. It was such a small thing, barely a touch at all, but that was all it took for him to remember that moment so many years ago, pressed up against the side of a building with teasing fingers tearing him apart.

A blush slowly overtook his features. His toes curled preemptively. Nervous energy replaced his earlier laziness. Every part of him buzzed with an itch he had no idea how to satisfy.

His desire, unbeknownst to Robert, began to tether itself inside his friend’s minds. He wasn’t sure the exact moment it manifested, only that a couple seconds later Marley was reaching out and softly scribbling fingers over his socked foot. Robert yelped, instantly jerking his foot back, though not by that much. “Dude, what the hell?”

Neon glanced over at them in surprise, searching for the source of disturbance. “What’s going on? Is something wrong?”

Marley himself looked just as confused, shaking his head slowly. “I-I don’t know… I didn’t mean to, honestly, you just looked so cute sitting there and I just had to…”

He trailed off, trying to puzzle it out. Even though he clearly hadn’t figured out what had just happened, Robert knew and a prickly feeling began to crawl over his skin, the beginnings of embarrassment. The desire to be tickled mercilessly while held down on the couch by two of the people he cared for most was overwhelming. However, this wasn’t Angela Jackson. This wasn’t some random girl in school. These were the first people he had found who genuinely seemed to care for him. He didn’t want to ruin that with some weird obsession that even he himself couldn’t explain.

Quickly scrambling from the couch, Robert reached out with his mind, willing them to forget the last couple minutes. After a while he could see their eyes cloud over and their easygoing expressions from before taking over. They fell back into easy conversation and Robert excused himself to the bathroom, needing to be alone so his quickly burgeoning desires didn’t wreck his one good relationship.

He waited in the bathroom for a while, waiting for his desire to shrink to something more manageable before finally reemerging. He made up some bullshit excuse about an upset stomach and things went back to normal, for the most part.

After that, the desire to be tickled quickly found itself popping up at the most inconvenient of times, leading to several sudden bathroom trips and hastily constructed excuses. He managed to suppress it for the most part, though. Sometimes he considered just letting the desire run rampant, but the conversation he would have to have with the others about it afterwards was harrowing enough that it overcame that.

Eventually that relationship was ruined too, though, and it wasn’t for several more years before he encountered that particular urge again.

The third incident occurred in a crappy hotel room while he was busy kidnapping his therapist’s brother. Damien, for he was finally Damien now, leaned against the wall and rattled off his ideas for dinner that night.

“We have pizza, Chinese, cheap yogurt I found at the convenience store,” he listed, putting down a finger for each suggestion. “And if none of that sounds good, may I suggest pizza?”

“You already said that.”

“Ah. Did I?”

Mark sighed in irritation. Formally sitting impatiently on the bed as he listened to Damien, he know flopped down on his back, one arm coming up to cover his eyes. “Why can’t you ever get us anything better than that junk food? What with your ability and everything?”

Damien examined him critically, pushing himself off the wall to come take a seat across from his splayed out form. “I thought you didn’t approve of me using my ability?”

“I don’t,” Mark agreed bitterly. “But if you’re going to be using it anyways, why not use it for something useful?”

“I’ve already told you.” Damien ran a hand flippantly through his hair, which was getting rather long. He was reminded of a car ride, a man with a shaved head and a stern face that was unusually playful that day, of a teasing remark. He gripped his hair tightly before letting go. “We can’t afford that. If anyone were to find out about us—”

“Yeah, yeah.” Mark closed his eyes, eyebrows pinched in resignation. Damien watched him, wanting more than anything to make him feel better. He wished that he could fuck off with rules and get them a reservation at some fancy restaurant that served lobster or steak or some fancy shit like that. Unfortunately, the rules were there for a reason and his ability didn’t extend to the impossible.

It made him uncomfortable, how he felt about Mark. He didn’t like the way his heart clenched whenever Mark was upset, or the way it did loopedy-loops in his chest when Mark flashed a rare, genuine smile at him, or how when Mark laughed he felt himself unconsciously doing the same, as though Mark were the one with powers instead of him. Damien wasn’t used to feeling this way about people. Even when he had been with Neon and the rest of them, he wouldn’t exactly categorize those feelings as caring--more a desperate neediness that he couldn’t see past to the people underneath. It wasn’t like that with Mark. That need was still there, but there was something else as well. He had a feeling that even if Mark wasn’t with him, even if Mark was off having a completely separate life from Damien, he would still want him to be happy.

“You know, you’re ability is pretty useless in the long run, isn’t it?” Mark commented, momentarily bringing him out of his stupor. “I mean, if you can’t even decide when you use it.”

“I do decide when I use it,” Damien said defensively, but not as defensively as he would have otherwise. He could sense there was a teasing edge to Mark’s words and whereas normally he hated to be teased, as it made him feel lesser, he didn’t mind it as much from Mark. “I just don’t want us to get caught.”

“Don’t want you to get caught.”

“Same difference. And besides, it’s better than having a power that doesn’t work at all.”

“Oh that’s it, you’re in for it now.”

Damien just barely had time to furrow his eyebrows in confusion before Mark was launching across the bed and digging fingers into a spot just underneath the former’s ribs. Damien yelped both in surprise and at the sensation, his arms shooting down to block the attack. “Dude, what the hell?”

“I put up with your bullshit 24/7,” Mark remarked, smirking as he wrestled with Damien’s arms, trying to pull them away from their protective stance. “I think some payback is due.”

Damien was twenty-seven years old now, no longer a little kid. He couldn’t help but recognize the sheer ridiculousness of a tickle fight between two grown men. Because of this, even as Mark managed to pull his arms above his head, even as he transferred that hold to one hand, even as he climbed on top of him and started climbing his fingers with the stupidest grin on his face up Damien’s sides, he couldn’t allow himself to give in to the happiness slowly sliding into place inside of him. He pressed his lips together, desperately trying to hold back the laughter that threatened to escape.

“Oh my god, I can’t believe you’re ticklish!” Mark exclaimed in surprise, parodying Angela Jackson’s words to him all those years ago. He seemed genuinely delighted, however, by the discovery, watching the way Damien scrunched up his face in an attempt to stifle any reactions with glee. “Edgy, dark, no-one-understands-me Damien is ticklish. God, this makes me so happy, yes!”

Damien was beginning to see just how much of Mark was the overshadowed little brother, finally able to take the vengeance he was never able to as a kid. Damien himself had never had siblings, thank god for them, so he was not as well-versed in the art of tickle fights. Because of this, he quickly found himself losing their battle, though at this point it was less of a battle and more of a one-sided attack.

“S-Shut uhup,” Damien stammered, barely holding back giggles as fingers climbed up and down his sides like the spiders from hell. “G-Get ohohoff of mehe!”

“You’re giggling,” Mark muttered, amazement in his voice. He was ignoring him. Great. “Wow, this is just… Do you know how much self-gratification I’m getting out of this? The great Damien, always so self-righteous, always in control, giggling under my hands like a five-year-old!”

Damien could feel the joy radiating off of him, Mark’s grin so infectious that it broke him finally, laughter spilling free and desperate from his lips as he squirmed underneath the other. “G-Gehehehe, duhuhude, nohohot c-cool! Fuhuhuck!”

“Are you ticklish here?” Mark asked teasingly, drilling his fingers into his armpits, and Damien screeched, twisting in a desperate attempt to get him off. An attempt that quickly failed as Damien realized how apparently strong of a hold Mark really had on him. “You are!”

“Shit, shit, shihihihihihihit!” Damien cursed, banging his head back against the bed. Fuck, that tickled. Like, a lot. If only he had been tickled more recently, maybe he would have known what he was getting himself into. Not that it would have stopped him from ending up here, but it would have been nice to know all the same. “G-Gahahahahahad, stahahahahap ihihihihit, nohohohoho!”

“Oh please,” Mark snorted, fingers persisting in the spot where his ribs met his armpits, a spot that was apparently deathly ticklish. “If you really wanted me to stop, you would just make me. Am I wrong?”

Damien blushed and shrieked with laughter, coherency long lost to him.

“I mean, that’s how it works, right?” Mark persisted, moving off of that spot which Damien was glad for. Unfortunately it meant that he was now fluttering his fingers lightly against his neck and that was somehow worse in a way. Damien may or may not have let out a noise equivalent to a squeal at that. “That’s what you’re always telling me anyway. ‘I didn’t mean to Mark, it just happened’ or ‘I can’t control it Mark, I want what I want’. So either you’re a liar or you really do like this.”

“F-Fuhuhuhuck yohohou!” Damien giggled, scrunching up his shoulders as he tried to evade his deft fingers. “Ihihihi dohohon’t lihihihike ihihihihit, yohohou dihihihihick!”

“Oh, name-calling?” Mark raised an eyebrow. “Interesting choice. I guess you wouldn’t mind if I tickled you here then?”

If Damien thought he was in hell before it was nothing compared to when Mark reached behind him and squeezed his knee. He hadn’t even known he was ticklish there. His leg jerked and an honest-to-god snort escaped him as his struggling intensified. “Ohohohoho mihihihihihihi gohohohohohod!”

“Was that a snort?”

“Shuhuhuhut ihihihihit!”

“Make me.”

Five minutes later, Damien lay curled up on one side of the bed, clutching his sides protectively. Mark sat on the other side, a grin lingering on his face as he watched the other man recuperate. “That was fun. I think we should try that again.”

Damien scoffed out a laugh, not even having enough energy to argue the statement.

“Do you like it?”

Damien stiffened, his smile fading as leftover panic from years ago set in like a returning houseguest. He didn’t have to answer. He knew that if he wanted to, he could avoid the entire conversation altogether. Instead, he just muttered, “What if I did? What’s it to you?”

There was silence from Mark’s side. Damien allowed it to go on for a minute before it became too much. He reluctantly turned over to face him, scowling so that he didn’t have to reveal how nervous he really was. “Well? Do you think I’m weird? Do you hate me now?”

Mark shook his head, chuckling incredulously. “No, Damien, I don’t hate you now. Even if I did, it wouldn’t be over something stupid like that. It would probably be over the kidnapping thing.”

Guilt snuck its way into Damien’s bones. “Yeah… that’s fair.”

Mark sighed, leaning back against the wall. “I don’t think it’s weird. I think the fact that you manipulate people with your mind is much weirder than any kind of tickling fetish.”

“It’s not a fetish,” Damien snapped defensively, not entirely sure if that was true or not. “I just like the… the closeness of it. I never really had that, so when I get it, it’s nice. I like it.”

“Then why tickling specifically?” Mark seemed genuinely curious about the answer, though Damien couldn’t tell if that was because of his ability or if because he was actually interested.

Damien shrugged, not looking at him. “Don’t know. It… I guess it feels nice. I like the…” He broke off, blushing for what felt like the millionth time that night. “Never mind. I don’t want to talk about this.”

“Okay,” Mark said after a moment. “But if you do want to talk about, you can. That’s what normal human beings do, you know. They talk about things.”

Damien fiddled with his hands. He opened his mouth. He closed his mouth. He huffed angrily. “I—”

“Yeah?”

“Shut up and let me talk, will you?”

“Thanks for being so polite about it,” Mark muttered, rolling his eyes.

“I guess I like… how it… uh, how it… how it makes me lose control.” He muttered the last bit of his sentence, clenching his hands into fists. “I never, er, get to lose control? So t-tickling is sort of like a method of doing that.”

Mark examined him for a moment, taking in how obviously nervous he was. “Okay.”

“Okay?” Damien snapped.

“Okay, that makes sense,” Mark clarified. “I get it. You never get to lose control, so tickling serves as a conduit to that.”

“Oh.” Damien didn’t know what to say. The concept that someone could respond well to his strange obsession had never occurred to him before. He flushed, again, because feelings were a dick. “Okay. Thanks.”

Mark tilted his head. “For what?”

Damien examined the gentle expression on his face, so accepting of this part of him that he had never allowed himself to love. He held back a smile. “Nothing. Fuck off. I’m getting us a pizza.”

“What? Again?”

“Okay, so you pick.”

The night devolved quickly back into arguments, but Damien couldn’t find it in himself to mind.

**Author's Note:**

> Just as a note, I am well aware of all the terrible things Damien has done in his life. This is in no way an erasure of any of that, merely showing a new side to him. I wanted to add some dimension to his character. So... please don’t hate!  
> You can find me at my tumblr: https://happyandticklish.tumblr.com/


End file.
